Public Stores

Public stores are search indexes that can be searched by any Mixedbread user. They include stores maintained by Mixedbread as well as stores shared publicly by other organizations.

When a store is public, users outside the owning organization can search it without being added to that organization. For cross-organization access, callers use the store's public name in store_identifiers.

Public NamesLink to section

Every public store has a public name in the following format:

{owner_org_slug}/{store_name}

For example, if the organization slug is acme and the store name is music, the public name is:

acme/music

Use that public name when searching a public store from another organization:

results = mxbai.stores.search(
  query="best ambient albums from the 1990s",
  store_identifiers=["acme/music"],
)

You can combine public stores with your own stores in a single search:

results = mxbai.stores.search(
  query="music licensing best practices",
  store_identifiers=[
      "acme/music",
      "industry-research",
      "partner-notes"
  ],
  top_k=15
)

Billing and API KeysLink to section

Billing for public store searches is tied to the API key that makes the request.

If a user from another organization searches acme/music using their own API key, the search is billed to their account, not to acme. Making a store public does not cause the store owner to pay for searches initiated by external users.

When sharing a public store with customers, partners, or other teams, provide:

• The public name, for example acme/music
• A sample search request using store_identifiers
• Clear guidance that searches are billed to the caller's API key

Mixedbread-Maintained Public StoresLink to section

Mixedbread maintains public stores that provide access to common data sources. These stores are identified by the mixedbread/ prefix.

mixedbread/webLink to section

A web search store that provides access to the latest information from across the internet. Use it to augment your AI applications with up-to-date web knowledge.

results = mxbai.stores.search(
  query="latest developments in large language models",
  store_identifiers=["mixedbread/web"],
  top_k=10
)

Use cases:

• Real-time information retrieval
• Fact-checking and verification
• Research augmentation
• Grounding AI responses with current web data